1. Technical Field
The present invention relates generally to the field of electronic mail, and in particular to techniques for arranging the display of electronic mail message that contains multiple appended messages. More particularly, the present invention relates to a method and system for adapting the display of a multiple message electronic mail thread in accordance with user-specified or autonomic header attribute processing techniques.
2. Description of the Related Art
Electronic mail, commonly referred to as e-mail, is a ubiquitous computer application that according to some estimates constitutes more than 50% of the average person's computer usage. Any mechanism with which e-mail usage can be made more efficient is therefore a welcome improvement, potentially having a dramatic cumulative impact on workplace and general end-user efficiency.
Many improvements in e-mail technology relate to providing the e-mail user with e-mail addressing and formulation tools to increase the efficiency of e-mail drafting and delivery. This is particularly true in the case of the e-mail thread, which is essentially an e-mail “conversation” occurring among two or more e-mail client stations. For example, when an e-mail message is received by a recipient networked computer, well-known e-mail client tools enable the recipient to strategically utilize portions of the content of the received message to respond in some manner. Typical of such options are a “reply to sender” option, a “reply to all” option, a “forward” option, etc. One advantageous feature of such e-mail functions is shared by the “reply” options which provide the message recipient with a convenient reply graphical user interface (GUI) in which some or all of the e-mail address content included in the received message is conveniently pre-loaded into the “send to” address field, thus relieving the recipient/replier from having to manually enter the address information. A more significant advantageous feature shared by the “forward” option as well as the “reply” options is that the message content of the original sender's message can automatically or optionally be included and appended onto the reply message drafted by the message recipient to be sent to one or more subsequent recipients.
This technique of incrementally building an e-mail thread comprising an appended list of messages that each, except for one “original,” are drafted somewhere along the message stream is well-known to most e-mail users. The many advantages of such cumulative appending of messages in any number of e-mail discourse scenarios is self-evident.
While such mechanisms provide an e-mail recipient with efficient e-mail response formulation and addressing, a significant problem remains relating to the inflexibility by which prior art e-mail clients display a multiple message e-mail thread. For example, and referring to FIG. 1, there is illustrated a multiple message e-mail thread display 10 as is known in the prior art. As shown in FIG. 1, the displayed thread 10 includes four messages 3, 5, 7, and 9, vertically arranged on the computer display screen (not depicted) in reverse chronological order (i.e. most recent on top). That is to say, the displayed vertical message order corresponding to the direction of conventional human reading order (i.e., top-to-bottom) is opposite to the chronological direction of the messages which begins at the bottom of the display with the initial originating thread message 9 and proceeds upward until it terminates with the most recent received reply message 3. This last-in-first-displayed message ordering enjoys the benefit of message review efficiency in that a recipient following or participating in the thread exchange will typically want the latest message posted at the top of the display.
While providing the convenience of displaying the last update, the foregoing conventional thread message ordering such as shown in FIG. 1 poses a significant problem relating to the ability of a given recipient, particularly a recipient newly added to the addressee list, to analyze and/or review a portion or all of the message list in order to understand or review the context of the message list discourse. Given the importance of chronology to human cognitive function, the most efficient way to understand the context of a sequential message list such as that shown in FIG. 1, is for the newly included thread recipient to scroll down to the beginning of the originating message 9 to the message beginning as depicted at the “start” step 1 read through the end of the message to the end step 2. The reader must then reverse directions to step 3, scrolling back up past message 9 to the top of message 7 and possible have to scroll downwardly as the end of message 7 is reached at step 4. The process continues similarly for message 5, scrolling up to step 5 and moving down to step 6, before the most recently received message 3 is similarly traversed at steps 7 and 8.
By requiring the reader to switch directions while traversing between messages, the foregoing procedure for reading a multiple message e-mail thread in chronological order, is inefficient in terms of time and energy expended manipulating the display, and more importantly, in terms of the reader maintaining his/her concentration. The extra time necessary for navigation and the loss of context by the reader during navigation, are both negatives for displaying the entire contents of an e-mail thread in this fashion. Inflexible chronological ordering of the displayed e-mail thread is an example of the significant problems and inefficiencies resulting from the lack of a user-controlled or autonomic e-mail thread display manager in the prior art.
From the foregoing, it can be appreciated that a need exists for an improved e-mail display system and method that provides a more flexible and user-friendly display of a multiple message e-mail thread. The present invention addresses this and other needs unresolved by the prior art.